So Jacob Frost Took a Plea…

The war on “terror” will never be over, it will just change locations. Like the war on drugs, prostitution, pornography, and the many others that will follow, it is a war on humanity. These wars will never be won; the State will just keep creating new boogiemen to frighten us with. The sheep will anxiously anticipate the next fall guy the State offers up as a sacrifice for the war on whatever happens to be next. Be careful, the next pawn could be me or you. - Mike Wasdin

On November 21st we posted here at CopBlock.org a write-up by Eric Freerock, Ohio Cop Block Admin Jailed For a Shipping Error, which communicated that Jacob Frost, plead “no contest” to a watered-down agreement of guilt in a situation that involved personnel from from “homeland security” and a substance some claim is “illicit”.

From Freerock:

Frost, has been sentenced to a ‘community-based corrections facility’ after pleading no contest to a charge of ‘attempted possession’ for having been shipped the banned substance methylone.

The kicker?

He didn’t actually order methylone.

To be clear – Frost did not order methylone. He ordered another substance (synthetic marijuana) that – as adverse to it as many have already commented they are – is not deemed “illicit.” Thus, he did not violate arbitrary man-made dictates conflated to be law.

Shouldn’t then, Frost’s receipt prove from his online purchase show that the substance shipped was an error on the vendors side? Yes.

Another component of this story that too negates Frost’s guilt was that the chain of custody for the shipped substance was totally compromised. Prior to Frost receiving the package it had been accidentally delivered to the wrong address, and the person there opened the package.

Shouldn’t then, the case against Frost have been thrown-out due to this factual inability to account for the contents of the shipment? Yes.

But Frost took a plea deal. He plead “no contest” because the alternative he faced – four or more years in a cage – was not for him worth the risk.

Prison is only one sentencing alternative. Other alternatives, less expensive to the tax payers, are possible and provide a more measured response. . .

W.O.R.T.H. will address positive values such as self-esteem, self-reliance, and human dignity, and make an effort to create a sense of belonging as if in a family structure, to promote stability so that an environment is created where the individual can internalize positive change.

As residents progress through the W.O.R.T.H. Program, privileges will be earned as individuals become more responsible for their lives. Conversely, if negative behavior warrants, more controls can be imposed and privileges can be restricted in a progressively intrusive manner to the point of probation revocation and sentence to long term incarceration in a state prison institution.

Frost called me on Wednesday, December 5th from the Worth Center.

My recount of our conversation, first shared with his friends in Ohio Cop Block, is below:

We’d only ascertained Frost’s whereabouts a couple days prior thanks to his bud and fellow Ohio Copblocker Kane Newkirk, who tracked down that info.

Two days prior to receiving that call from Frost I’d called the Worth Center, after which I shared this update with those in Ohio Cop Block:

First off and most-important – should Jacob in that situation? Should he have his choices and freedom of movement restricted?

Nope. There was no victim.

It’s clear to anyone familiar with this situation that Frost’s treatment has nothing to do with “justice.” He harmed no one. He’s just a number, another case, to be run through the system by his captors.

Those who targeted Frost acted according to the perverse incentives inherent in the top-down monopoly for which they work. They have an incentive to create criminals where there are none.

Those responsible – the men and women with badges who kidnapped and caged him, the “prosecutor”, “judge”, those who transported him, and those now supervising every aspect of his life – likely went about their interactions with him as a matter of routine.

Looking throughout history, when institutions are created that by their very existence make more-likely the subjugation of the rights of another individual, it doesn’t lead to good outcomes. Instead, unthinking individuals cause real harm, all the while assuaging their own conscience by saying, “I’m just doing my job.” (Apparently though, for many such folks, their conscience is never completely muted as the “profession” of law enforcement suffers from the highest or one of the highest rates of alcoholism, domestic abuse, and suicide).

While I personally don’t have interest in smoking synthetic marijuana (and in fact I encourage people not to use it per a negative experience I had myself back in 2010 when in Vegas), the fact that Jacob smoked it or at least in this instance, ordered it, doesn’t make him a criminal.

I favor free trade in drugs for the same reason the Founding Fathers favored free trade in ideas: in a free society it is none of the government’s business what ideas a man puts into his mind; likewise, it should be none of its business what drugs he puts into his body.
– Thomas Szasz

Even if all readers of CopBlock.org, or all those supposedly controlled by a gang of people who collectively dub themselves the “State of Ohio”, agreed that synthetic marijuana was harmful, that still doesn’t preclude Frost’s right to ingest it, or any other substance he chooses.

If I don’t have the right to tell you what you can or cannot ingest I can’t suddenly gain that ability if I was part of a larger group who advocated as such. Rights are not created by groups. The same is true were I to add a badge to my attire or have a fancy title.

If Frost harms himself, that’s his fault. If he harms someone else, he’s responsible. That is true whether one is sober or not. Synthetic marijuana is not the issue.

The real issue is ideas, and specifically, the fact that so many people actively or tacitly perpetuate the bad idea that a stranger has the right to dictate one’s life.

That bad idea gives credence to flawed legalese (conflated to be “law”) and absolves personal responsibility for those men and women who actually acted in the wrong (who tracked Frost’s package, which again, was a consensual interaction he had reached with another party), and who broke into his residence, stole his property, kidnapped, caged, and threatened him.

Those factors, again reliant entirely on a bad idea, meant Frost was confronted with a situation in which was on the defensive. Rather than risk his chances in legal land (which, as anyone who has been entwined there knows, is the epitome of arbitrariness) he essentially threw-up his hands and plead no contest. He saw the threats levied at him – wrong as they are, and knew that they could be implemented since so many have yet to ignore the claims made by self-described “authorities.” It’s simply been peddled so much through gun-run (public) indoctrination and mainstream media. Thus, Frost opted for a lesser “punishment.”

Was that the right choice? Perhaps you or I would have pursued another avenue – maybe pointing out that we hadn’t in fact ordered methylone or that the package had been intercepted – but it was Frost in this situation and he acted as he best saw fit.

And unfortunately, other individuals (you? someone you care about?) will continue to be harassed for non-violent, non-victim actions until we each conclude that such treatment is not ideal, and we change the way we think and act.

The surest way to make that happen is for us each to really consider the structure of the failed criminal injustice system and conclude that we can do better.

Safety can never be had through people who first steal your money. Security will never be gotten when there’s no recourse for accountability or check on claimed abilities. Those admirable goals will happen only after we each reject the bad idea of external arbitrary authority.

Ideas have consequences.

Being intellectually honest means exposing yourself to different ideas and allowing yourself to modify your own when presented with those better.

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About The Author

Pete EyrePete Eyre is co-founder of CopBlock.org. As an advocate of peaceful, consensual interactions, Eyre seeks to inject a message of complete liberty and self-government into the conversation of police accountability.Eyre went to undergrad and grad school for law enforcement, then spent time in DC as an intern at the Cato Institute, a Koch Fellow at the Drug Policy Alliance, Directer of Campus Outreach at the Institute for Humane Studies, Crasher-in-Chief at Bureaucrash, and as a contractor for the Future of Freedom Foundation.He later hit the road as co-founder of the Motorhome Diaries and Liberty On Tour, and now resides in the 'shire.

What’s missing here? If there was factual proof that he didn’t order the banned substance, and there was no documented chain of custody, how could the DA possibly have secured a conviction? It doesn’t matter what they threatened, a freaking 1st year law student could have beat this one. I just can’t figure out why he would have taken a plea.

unclezip

Never, Ever cop a plea! No matter what they tell you, don’t cop a plea! I don’t really understand why this guy did, unless he was at least partly guilty in the first place.

deepelemblues

Story still doesn’t add up, the drunkest, dumbest lawyer in America would demand the police produce the methylone and get records for the chain of custody, shipping numbers, confirmation, e-mails from the website, etc. So why wasn’t this done?

Jean

I think the answer to why there was no trial (based on the evidence presented here) was the concern that the jury would be stacked, and that the “receipt of illicit property” would be adequate to secure a conviction.
In other words, he didn’t have to BE guilty (Mens Rea, or Guilty Mind), the statute would say he had done something wrong without even knowing it. Similar to a parking ticket: You parked, fed the meter, came back late, and had a ticket on the car. You’re guilty by statute, even if you were late because someone had a heart attack and you kept them alive with CPR. But you’re still guilty of being late feeding the meter, no intent required.

That is assuming there isn’t a stacked jury (jury biased against drugs, say), a kangaroo court which would find him guilty if it had been mailed to Antarctica and never been received by him (substance ordered, shipped, delivered is all irrelevant), AND assuming that he could get a lawyer. I’ve heard of cases where the defendent acts Pro Se because his assets are frozen (so he has nothing), yet he’s “got money”, and is thus able to afford an attorney, so he can’t get a public defender even. Lovely country we have here, the Berlin Wall’s been replaced with such lovely golden wires…

Plenty of reasons to accept a plea, especially if there’s any REAL question as to the honesty and integrity to local police. A no-knock @ 3 AM to your family’s home could occur on a “bad drug tip,” but it won’t bring back Mom or Dad now that they’re dead. Meantime, you’re still in prison, may not make it out, ever – as the guards could give a shiv to an inmate, too.

Once you look into the abyss, you find it’s endless. That’s why we need second amendment rights, to make sure the others can in fact be exercised, and rights not even enumerated in the Constitution or Declaration of Independence are sometimes in need of enforcement.

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.
Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these States. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
… … …

(Emphasis in bold, underline mine; text italicized because it is a quote. Note that the rights to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness are not all-inclusive, merely SOME of the rights a living being has – simply by being alive. Might want to think about this.)

Jean

Eh, Underlines didn’t work. :-(

G. Asher

I have zero respect for you Frost. You gave in.

PSOSGT

So…. you didn’t order methylone, but you admit to ordering synthetic marijuana….which is illegal in Ohio. So….if they had shipped you the correct item, you still would be in violation of the law. what am I missing here?????

Jean

POSSGT:
– Even if he ordered something illegal, that’s NOT what he’s being charged with.
– Even IF he ordered the SUBSTANCE he’s being charged with ordering, THE ITEM WAS SENT TO THE WRONG PLACE AND OPENED THERE. Sounds like a dead-drop.

The police did everything but place the order to frame him.

John Q Public

Jean, can you say for sure what he did? Were you involved? Frost knew he was screwed so he did what he had to do. I guess you’re going to take back his copblock credentials now.

t.

@certain: He took the plea because you aren’t being told the whole story / truth. You are being told the cop blocker side of it in all of its biased glory. That why he took the plea. Be cause as you correctly observed…if what is being stated were true, a first year law student to win this. Hey, look there, you actually got one right. Cut a notch in the wall.

@Jean: kkep thinking. Its what you do best. Uggg. I vomited a little on that one. Sorry.

VK

I Know This Is An Old story But I Just Want To Clear Things About The Questions By
The CommenteRs.Jake Took The Plea Because He Was New To The Legal SystemAnd
Was Intimidated. Yes Its True That There Was A Chain Of Custody Issue And No Strong Evidence
That He Order Anything Illegal But The Fear Of The State Can Break A Persons Will. If
He Could Go Back Knowing What He Knows Now I Doubt He Would Take The Plea. The Synthetic
Cannabinoids He Was Ordering Were Not Illegal In Ohio At The Time. That Is All.